


a touch of nature

by hardboiledmeggs



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Grand Canyon National Park, M/M, Take Your Fandom to Work Day, foolin' around in the outdoors, salty Steve Rogers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-19
Updated: 2016-04-19
Packaged: 2018-06-03 06:48:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6601000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hardboiledmeggs/pseuds/hardboiledmeggs
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In 1938, Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes join the Civilian Conservation Corps. They are assigned to work at Grand Canyon National Park.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a touch of nature

**Author's Note:**

> So I’ve SORT OF cheated with this fic, in that this isn’t my exact job (I’m sure you’re all shocked to learn that I don’t work for the Civilian Conservation Corps…) or my exact workplace. However, the Grand Canyon is a place where I have lived, it is connected to my workplace, and if one were to think even a little deeply about this little story and what the Grand Canyon _is_ , they could probably deduce who my employer is. 
> 
> So. Here goes.

_"One touch of nature makes the whole world kin."_  
_\- John Muir_

**1938.**

It isn’t that Bucky regrets joining the CCC. He and Steve get three square meals a day – which is already a hell of a lot more than they were getting back in Brooklyn – and a rent-free roof to sleep under. And the arid desert air has dried out Steve’s soggy lungs, which Bucky is grateful for. And how the hell else would two dumb, poor kids from Brooklyn have seen the Grand Canyon, anyway? 

But for all his gratitude, Bucky sees how the work takes its toll on Steve. They spend a long, hot month on the South Rim, stacking stones into walls, clearing trails, building benches and viewpoints for rich, foreign tourists. By the end of the day, it’s all Steve can do to fall face-down on his cot, covered in dried sweat and dust, and sink to sleep. 

Those nights, Bucky leaves him in the boxy canvas tent they share with two other enrollees and heads to the rec hall, or to the El Tovar to pick up one of the hotel’s pretty clerks on her way back to the women’s dormitory. More often than not, he strikes out – it’s hard to compete with the straight-backed national park rangers, with their shiny badges and dapper hats. Every girl has the CCC boys pegged as scrappy-but-penniless, and that doesn’t turn many heads.

Bucky hates it. He feels alone and ignored and too worried about Steve to even enjoy the scenery. But after a month, Steve’s wheezing and weak arms get him pulled from heavy labor. He’s given a flat hat of his own, and gives tours along the rim, pointing out the different layers of sandstone, limestone, and shale on the canyon’s steep faces. Bucky can tell that the reassignment wounds Steve’s pride, but hell, as long as Steve still gets his thirty dollars a month and still gets to sleep in the cot next to him, Bucky could care less.

At the end of his shift on one boiling hot September day, Bucky finds Steve hunkered down on an abandoned, shady stretch of trail leading down into the canyon. Steve’s hat is on the ground next to him. A sketchpad rests on his lap, and a pencil’s fitted in his hand; Bucky can see that he's sketched out rough outlines of the canyon’s dramatic rock formations. His sleeves are rolled up to the elbow, his forest-green tie is pulled loose, the top few buttons of his collar are undone, revealing the soft curve of his throat. Bucky’s stomach flips. He tightens his hands into fists. 

When Steve looks up, Bucky jerks his chin in greeting; it feels curt and masculine and appropriate. Steve nods. Bucky suddenly wishes he’d had the wherewithal to clean up a little, to put a shirt on and comb his hair. Instead, he’s coming to Steve in his grubby dungarees and work cap, with his chest bare – his skin is nut-brown, and covered in the canyon’s grime. 

“How’d it go today?” he asks, lowering himself into the patch of dirt next to Steve.

“Toured around a buncha goddamn Krauts, can you believe that?” Steve’s face twists into a mask of dismay. Steve’s the least prejudiced man Bucky knows, but the Germans gassed his father, and that’s that.

They sit together in silence for a while, watching as the sun shifts and grows lower in the sky, stretching the shadows around them and turning the canyon a million different shades of crimson, violet, and coral.

“I wish we could stay here, you know?” 

Bucky smiles, “What about the Krauts?”

“Fuck ‘em,” Steve spits into the red dust and squints, looking out across the canyon. “The United States Government decided that this place was too goddamn beautiful and special to screw up. It’s like they knew we’d fill it with garbage or some shit if they gave us half a chance.” He chews on the end of his pencil, thinking. “I like that. That idea. That we can rise up, be better, protect the things that need to be protected.” 

Bucky nods silently. His heart aches. This is the kind of thing that made him go all soft and weak for Steve in the first place – his righteous indignation, his innate desire to do good, the sheer nobility that inspires every bloody scrape he gets himself into.

“Yeah,” he says at last. “Maybe after our gig is up, we can stick around. And if they don’t let us, we’ll hide in the mule barn.” He grins and nudges his shoulder against Steve’s. Steve rolls his eyes. The dumb, gentle touch of their bodies together sparks something inside Bucky that he quickly tamps down.

Steve gets awkward then, setting down his sketchpad and pencils, shifting in the dirt, stretching and unstretching his legs, rubbing at his jaw. It’s the way he always gets before… Bucky thinks it – what it feels like to have Steve pressed up against him, what Steve’s mouth feels like under his – and _un_ -thinks it as fast as he can. It’s something they’ve only done together a handful of times, and in the month they’ve been in Arizona, they haven’t done it at all.

But then Steve looks at him, takes a deep, hitching breath, and leans in, brushing their lips together in a way that makes Bucky’s heart jump into his throat.

“What if—“ Bucky starts, worried.

“Nobody here but the buzzards,” Steve whispers, his eyes are heavy-lidded, but fixed on Bucky.

Bucky huffs and hauls Steve forward, grabbing him by the back of the neck and shoulders until they’re shoved up tight against each other. It’s the most alone they’ve been – away from the hectic, crowded city, nestled against the face of a cliff with only fresh air and ancient soil around them. Steve quickly takes full advantage of their solitude, running his hands across Bucky’s bare back, chest, neck, face. 

Bucky feels himself slide out of control. If Steve’s greatest strength is his noble principles, Bucky has prided himself on his own self-discipline, on how steadfastly he has maintained his feelings. Now, though, he is unraveling. His whole body flushes, he breathes in short, frantic gasps, he grabs at Steve’s shirt and pulls the buttons loose. His hands push under the cotton twill; his fingers spread wide on Steve’s chest, feeling his body’s warmth through his thin undershirt.

“We have to go back,” Bucky gasps, pulling back as far as he can go without breaking his own heart. His voice is desperate and torn, “They’ll start dinner soon, and— and they’ll know. They’ll know.”

Steve laughs with his face still pressed up against Bucky’s. “Yeah? You assume every guy who skips mess is out screwin’ another fella?”

“Christ, Steve, don’t say stuff like that if you aren’t serious.” A low heat pools in Bucky’s belly; every part of him aches for Steve.

“Ain’t never a time I wasn’t serious about you.”

Steve kisses him again, and time passes slow and sweet. He clambers into Bucky’s lap, straddling his waist, pushing his tongue into Bucky’s mouth, rutting his hips against Bucky’s in a way that brings them both dangerously close to the brink. Bucky threads his hands into Steve’s hair, then folds his arms around Steve’s shoulders. He doesn’t know how far they ought to go, how far he ought to push Steve, but then Steve grabs him by the wrist and leads his fingers to the fly of his uniform slacks. 

Bucky stills his trembling hand long enough to push the metal button through its hole when, in the distance, the mess hall dinner bell echoes through the canyon. Steve jumps, pulling away and looking suddenly unsure despite his earlier bluster.

“We should—“

“Should we?”

“We should.”

They rise to their feet together. Steve gives Bucky a heated, sultry look as he buttons his pants and straightens his shirt and tie. Bucky’s face flushes; he fills his lungs and straightens his back, willing away the nearly-unbearable erection Steve has left him with.

“We’ll just—“

“It’s…”

They both manage a laugh at their combined discomfort. Bucky leads the way back up the narrow trail, with Steve walking behind him. He’s glad Steve can’t see his face – he’s sure that he’d see every ounce of longing and love and disappointment there. He shares everything with Steve, but somehow this feels personal and secret, something he isn’t fully sure he should share.

Bucky can’t know yet, the plans Steve has for him. That in a few hours, after the sun has set and the camp lights have gone out, he’ll follow Steve out of their tent and past the tree line, where they’ll make love under a clear sky, pressed against the rough bark of a spruce tree, with dry pine needles crunching under their feet and Steve gasping a confession into his ear.

Bucky doesn’t know yet, how complete and satisfied and wild he’ll feel, with Steve on him and around him and inside him, in a place where the veil between the natural and human world is thin.

But he will.

**Author's Note:**

> Historical footnote: The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was a public work relief program that operated from 1933 to 1942 in the United States for unemployed, unmarried men from relief families as part of the New Deal. CCC enrollees worked in public lands throughout the country, including many national parks. More [here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_Conservation_Corps).
> 
> The graphic that helped me write it is on tumblr More [here](http://hardboiledmeggs.tumblr.com/post/143072445042/title-a-touch-of-nature-relationships-james).


End file.
